Publishers Weekly
09/09/2019
Weiss, a staff editor and writer for the New York Times opinion section, investigates the global resurgence of anti-Semitism and offers helpful tactics to prevent its spread in this impassioned wake-up call. She begins with the 2018 mass shooting at Tree of Life synagogue in her hometown of Pittsburgh, an event that “marked the before and the after” in her awareness that anti-Semitism is not a thing of the past. She then traces the history of “the Jew-hating disease” from Egypt in 300 BCE to 21st-century America, where President Trump’s “dog whistling” draws conspiracy theorists, white supremacists, and anti-Semites to his banner. But Weiss argues that anti-Semitism is “more insidious and perhaps more existentially dangerous” when it originates on the political left, because “it pretends to be the opposite of what it actually is.” She notes that liberal college campuses are hotbeds of anti-Zionism, where many Jews report “preemptively censoring themselves.” Weiss outlines the best practices for Jews and their allies to fight back, including denouncing anti-Semitic ideas vocally, especially when they’re espoused by progressives, and resisting “hierarchical identity politics” that rank groups on the degree to which they’re oppressed. Weiss’s refreshingly forthright opinions and remarkably thorough yet concise history lessons make this a must-read for anyone seeking to understand and stop the rise of a pernicious ideology. (Sept.)
From the Publisher
A timely warning against a Judaism that trembles at the knees.”—Washington Examiner
“Bari Weiss has written what must be judged a brave book. . . . Weiss has delivered a praiseworthy and concise brief against modern-day anti-Semitism.”—The New York Times
“Weiss’s book feels like one long, soul-wrenching letter, written in a charmingly accessible style by a proud American reeling from the realization that the haters are on the rise in this land we love.”—Jewish Journal
“An important read . . . Because a battle over normalizing anti-Semitism is already underway, Weiss’s real public service is encouraging mainstream Americans to join the forces of light.”—The Federalist
“What Heinrich Graetz required six volumes of Jewish history to encompass, Bari Weiss has achieved with remarkable succinctness. This important book will engender a thousand conversations.”—Cynthia Ozick
“Her childhood synagogue in Pittsburgh was the site of last year’s Shabbat morning massacre. This passionate, vividly written, regularly insightful book is her pained, fighting elegy.”—The Guardian
“A bold summons to confront humanity’s oldest hatred.”—National Review
“Weiss’s refreshingly forthright opinions and remarkably thorough yet concise history lessons make this a must-read for anyone seeking to understand and stop the rise of a pernicious ideology.”—Publishers Weekly
“At the core of the text is the author’s concern for the health and safety of American citizens, and she encourages anyone ‘who loves freedom and seeks to protect it’ to join with her in vigorous activism.”—Kirkus Reviews
“This is the most important book you will read this year. Concise, morally certain, it’s a bullet train from the first sentence to the last. There needs to be a copy in every classroom in the country. If you think something dark is rising, you’re right. What can you do? This is what you do.”—Caitlin Flanagan, staff writer, The Atlantic, and author of To Hell with All That
“How to Fight Anti-Semitism is urgent, frank, and fearless. There is something here to offend everyone—because there is something here to awaken everyone.”—Rabbi David Wolpe, author of David: The Divided Heart
“While European anti-Semitism has put Jews in mortal danger for too long, the ‘shining city upon a hill’—America—has descended into this same toxic darkness. Bari Weiss’s book is a powerful wake-up call against complacency and should push all freethinkers on both sides of the Atlantic to take a stand against new guises of the oldest form of hate in the world. How to Fight Anti-Semitism? Yes. But it could also be called How to Save Liberal Democracy.’”—Bernard-Henri Lévy, bestselling author of The Empire and the Five Kings
Kirkus Reviews
2019-08-22
Known for her often contentious perspectives, New York Times opinion writer Weiss battles societal Jewish intolerance through lucid prose and a linear playbook of remedies.
While she was vividly aware of anti-Semitism throughout her life, the reality of the problem hit home when an active shooter stormed a Pittsburgh synagogue where her family regularly met for morning services and where she became a bat mitzvah years earlier. The massacre that ensued there further spurred her outrage and passionate activism. She writes that European Jews face a three-pronged threat in contemporary society, where physical, moral, and political fears of mounting violence are putting their general safety in jeopardy. She believes that Americans live in an era when "the lunatic fringe has gone mainstream" and Jews have been forced to become "a people apart." With palpable frustration, she adroitly assesses the origins of anti-Semitism and how its prevalence is increasing through more discreet portals such as internet self-radicalization. Furthermore, the erosion of civility and tolerance and the demonization of minorities continue via the "casual racism" of political figures like Donald Trump. Following densely political discourses on Zionism and radical Islam, the author offers a list of bullet-point solutions focused on using behavioral and personal action items—individual accountability, active involvement, building community, loving neighbors, etc.—to help stem the tide of anti-Semitism. Weiss sounds a clarion call to Jewish readers who share her growing angst as well as non-Jewish Americans who wish to arm themselves with the knowledge and intellectual tools to combat marginalization and defuse and disavow trends of dehumanizing behavior. "Call it out," she writes. "Especially when it's hard." At the core of the text is the author's concern for the health and safety of American citizens, and she encourages anyone "who loves freedom and seeks to protect it" to join with her in vigorous activism.
A forceful, necessarily provocative call to action for the preservation and protection of American Jewish freedom.